Saturday, 9 March 2013

MY FIRST EVER TANJORE PAINTING

Finally, this painting is complete.And, I love it. Ganesha has always bben an inspiration. You probably will find Ganesha in every art form that I try. I am untrained artist. I usually see pics and paintings and try to copy them. Most of the time, i can do it right but sometimes my efforts are no good. For Tanjore paintings, I had always wanted to learn in the proper way. So began my lessons for this art form.
I would be lying if I said this was veryhard to do. It is obviously labour intensive, but except for the painting part of it, it is pretty much an effort of patience.
I would so like to explain what Tanjore paintings are, but then there are hundreds of sites doing the same. So I'll give a basic outline for the work done. (The only advice I have for someone trying to learn this art is to find a good tescher and learn it properly. The resulting painting is something you'll have for years altogether and having parfect one beats having one with something done wrong)
There are 4 basic procedures involved with this painting.
1- preparation of board
2- use of semiprecious stones
3- use of gold foil
4- painting of the figures

This is what you usually get on the net. But, actually there is a proper way to do this. Sticking of stones and gold foil, removing of gold foil, and the actual painting part all have inherent intricate details. I, for one am glad that I learned from a teacher. It is not that people writing on these sites are misguiding anybody. No, they are not. But nobody loves to give trade secrets away and even if they did give the entire procedure in detail,how would you know if you've done it right or wrong.
In any case, its something worth the effort.
Here you have my completed painting , all ready. Then I have some closeups of the face and eyes. This was a specialised part of work. According to my teacher you cannot make too many mistakes on the face. Since poster colours are used, they cannot be cleaned and repainted. The entire painting and shading is done in layers and white and yellow colours especially stand out. If you make mistakes on these colours it's difficult to correct it. I should know, for I made ahuge mess of Ganesha's dothi (lower clothes). That's where a teacher comes in handy. She helped me correct my mistakes without harm to my painting. So, taking no risk, she heped paint the face. The detailing is amazing. I am going to paint the face in my next painting for sure and hope I get the same effect